The Path Leading To Emptiness | Online Retreat July 2024

Ajahn Anan teaches that all things that arise are subject to cessation — a core wisdom of the Buddha. Enlightenment may seem sudden, but it arises from long-cultivated causes: generosity, virtue, concentration, and deep contemplation. Great disciples of the Buddha, like Yasa, awakened quickly because their spiritual faculties were already mature.

Ajahn Anan encourages us to build these foundations daily through meditation, reflection, and ethical living. By wiping away the "dust" on the heart—our defilements—we bring clarity and readiness for wisdom to arise. With sincerity, patience, and continuous practice, the realization of the Dhamma is possible.

Transcript

So now may all of you sit in meditation while listening to the Dhamma.

So it's likely that you've all heard the first teaching that the Buddha gave,

The Dhamma Cakkappavattana Sutta,

Where he taught about the Dhamma in a very short and easy way,

Which is that all things which are of the nature to arise are of the nature to cease.

And so this was a wisdom teaching that he gave.

So it's like Zen.

In the Zen tradition they teach with wisdom.

And so really all of the teachings that the Buddha gave,

They came from wisdom.

And so these teachings that he gave to his disciples,

That he gave them and then the disciples would think about them,

Contemplate them,

Maybe they would take those teachings back with them and contemplate them later,

Or maybe they would contemplate them right on the spot,

And then a clear knowing would arise within them with ease.

But that's because they were mature,

Already mature in terms of practice,

That their samadhi was already very powerful,

That their faith was full of energy,

That all of these qualities,

All of the faculties and the powers had great energy to them.

And these are the qualities which take one to attaining to the Dhamma.

So they're already very full.

They'd trained themselves well already.

Zen the Buddha didn't need to teach them about virtue,

About samadhi,

But rather he gave them these deep teachings on wisdom so that they could understand and gain that wisdom and they can gain clear knowing.

And often that would happen instantly.

So for us we want to be like that as well.

So maybe we study Zen,

For instance,

And we feel like that really suits our hearts,

We really like it,

We want to go that way,

Which is very quick,

The shortcut route to knowing and attaining.

But the thing is,

Is that all things arise due to conditions,

And we need to bring up the causes and conditions first.

And so for one to be able to practice quickly,

To understand quickly,

They need to have created the causes for that beforehand.

So just listening to the Dhamma like Ajna Kandanya did,

That he was a Brahman already,

He had practiced the brahmacharya,

The holy life already,

His sila,

His virtue was complete already,

He had developed his samadhi to the highest level already,

And all he was missing was just this aspect of wisdom.

And lacking in that,

Then he couldn't reach true knowing.

So all it took then was the Buddha to teach him just a little bit,

And he could know with clarity.

And the other four ascetics were like this as well,

That all their different qualities were at a full level.

And so they listened to the Dhamma in this last life of theirs and could understand.

But you see how before that,

Just within that last life,

They already needed to have practiced a lot.

And then if we think about their lives prior to the last one,

Just how much Barami they needed to have cultivated to be able to know and attain so quickly.

So in order to know and see with clarity,

Then there needs to be causes and conditions put in place first.

So we right now are putting in place those causes and conditions,

Coming on this retreat,

Whether in this monastery,

Joining at home,

Or just in our everyday lives,

The meditation that we do each and every day.

This is creating these causes and conditions.

And we do that first until they reach a state of completion and fullness.

And then perhaps in this life,

We listen to a teaching of the Buddha.

So like now,

The Dhamma that I'm teaching,

This is the Dhamma of the Buddha that I'm taking to talk to you about.

Or we listen to the Dhamma of an awakened teacher,

And then we practice in line with that.

And then perhaps we can understand when we do that,

Contemplate into the Dhamma,

And see the Dhamma.

And it's possible for that to happen instantly while we're listening to these teachings.

But for that to happen,

One needs to have created the causes for that first.

And if one hasn't done that,

Then one won't experience them.

So for those who hadn't created those causes,

Then the Buddha started by teaching them about generosity and virtue,

Bringing up a happiness and ease into their hearts.

And then he taught them about the dangers and the drawbacks of that happiness.

And so they then inclined and opened their hearts towards listening to teachings on Nekamma,

On renunciation.

It's like for us,

We're sitting in meditation,

We're training in Samadhi,

And that is Nekamma,

That's renunciation.

Because we are moving away from the mind which is creating,

Concocting.

Moving away from finding delight and pleasure in sensory experiences.

And so this is Nekamma,

This renunciation through our body,

Speech,

And mind.

So if we don't see the drawbacks of these things,

Then we won't be able to develop this quality of Nekamma or practice it.

And so in that state,

Then if we listen to the Four Noble Truths,

Then we won't be able to understand,

Won't be able to see the Dhamma.

And that's because our Barami hasn't reached that point yet.

But all people want to be at that point.

But if we haven't put in the causes and conditions,

Then we aren't there yet.

And so we need to build this up first.

So like Yasa,

Who was the son of,

Born into a very wealthy family in Varanasi.

And he created these causes and conditions.

So when he was with some of his followers or retinue,

He saw them all lying there asleep.

And he really felt like they were all corpses.

Corpses lying in a charnel ground.

Previously he had had such happiness and all different kinds of entertainment and fun.

But now this jnana,

This true knowledge came up.

And he saw this nimitta,

This image.

And why was that?

It was because in previous lives he had practiced asubha.

So this meditation on seeing bodies as being unattractive.

And in particular there was one life where he worked at burning the corpses of people who didn't have any relatives to take care of their corpses.

And there was one corpse that was burning.

But the fire wasn't quite enough to burn the stomach.

So he got a stick and he was prodding the stomach,

Poking away.

And he saw how the pus was oozing out of it.

And that image that he saw stayed with him and became an image that was really burnt into his eyes.

So he created so much bharami in many lives until that was in a state of completion.

He had created a lot of samadhi before and all that was left was wisdom.

So when this bharami that he had created appeared and came up in his final life,

Then he saw the people around him.

And he thought of them as being like corpses.

And he felt this chastened dispassion in his heart.

He saw how all the wealth that he had,

All the enjoyment he found in the world,

All the people around him were all impermanent things.

And if we don't see things in this way then we can't go off and ordain.

And there'd still be this attachment to pleasure and to ease.

So he felt this deep agitation or chaos in his heart.

So he went out to seek some peace.

And he wandered into the deer park.

And the Buddha knew.

So he called out,

Yassa,

Come here.

Here it's not chaotic.

And he thought,

Wow,

He knows my name already.

And he knows that my mind is in a state of chaos as well.

So there was this really full faith that came up.

So his heart was in a state where he was able to accept the Dhamma.

And the Buddha taught about generosity,

Virtue,

And meditation.

He already felt this weariness.

So the Buddha then taught him about the Four Noble Truths and how we suffer because of the way that we cling to physical and mental things.

And so this was just a short teaching,

But he reached stream entry at that point,

Right?

And then his mother and father came looking,

Trying to find where their son had gone off to.

But the Buddha made it so that his mother and father weren't able to see him sitting there.

And then he taught Yassa's mother and father about generosity,

Virtue,

And meditation as well.

And the benefits of generosity and virtue.

Then went on to Nekamma,

Renunciation.

And then taught them to practice the Four Noble Truths.

That of Dukkha,

The state of discontent or suffering,

The causes of Dukkha,

The cessation of Dukkha,

And the path leading to the cessation of Dukkha.

And through that then,

Right there,

His mother and father reached stream entry.

And Yassa himself became an Arahant.

Just through that second teaching that he heard.

And so this was an immediate,

Very quick knowing that came up because of his wisdom.

And then when his mother and father were able to see him again,

Then they knew immediately what had happened.

Because his face,

His features were so bright and clear and radiant,

They knew that,

Oh my son has attained to the Dhamma already.

So they invited both the Buddha and their son to their house for the meal.

So we see that their Barami was already brought up and full.

Both the mother and the father and their son,

Yassa.

And they also had made this aspiration to listen to the Dhamma of a fully awakened Buddha.

We see how all things have causes and conditions for them to happen.

So we need to contemplate as well.

And if when we contemplate we don't see the Dhamma,

We don't know the Dhamma,

Then we need to create the causes for that first.

We need to be lifting up the energy of our hearts.

And so how do we do that?

On this aspect of generosity,

That you're all very generous people already.

Siddha is something that you are practicing already,

So carry on practicing that.

And with mindfulness and samadhi,

This is something that you need to do a lot for the sake of this quality of wisdom to arise.

Paññā wisdom being a thorough all-round knowing of conditioned phenomena in their truth.

That all physical and mental things are not self.

So when we understand this,

Oh this is where we gain clear understanding right at this point.

And so you can do this even though you may be lay people,

That you can gain this knowledge.

So if you have wisdom,

Then you're able to gain knowledge and see and attain the Dhamma like this.

So like in the Mahayana tradition,

There was the sixth Zen patriarch of China,

Huineng.

And he,

When he was a child,

His father passed away when he was seven.

So he had to go off to work cutting wood.

But he listened one day to a sutra about emptiness,

Anatta,

Not self.

And he contemplated that teaching and understood clearly,

Even though he was a lay person.

And then he asked,

Where did you hear that sutra from,

Which monastery?

So he went out to follow and to study and came to live in a Zen monastery where he worked in the kitchen.

He worked cutting the wood and tending to the fire and cooking rice to offer to all the monks in the monastery.

And he listened to one of the elderly monks there teach about the heart,

That if dust alights on the heart,

Then we should wipe that away to bring it to clarity.

And so,

If there's defilements in the heart,

Then we should contemplate to bring that to clarity.

So he understood that teaching clearly.

So this teaching that this monk had given and had written,

That the body is like a Bodhi tree and the mind is like a bright mirror.

And always be wiping this mirror so that dust doesn't alight on it.

So we should then be wiping our hearts constantly and so that the defilements don't alight on our hearts.

So when he heard this teaching,

He asked one of the monks there to help him write a teaching of his own on the wall.

And what he asked this monk to write was that originally Bodhi has no tree.

And originally there is no bright mirror.

And when there isn't anything,

Then where can the dust alight?

And so this is a teaching on Anatta,

On not-self.

And when the fifth patriarch came to read this teaching,

Then he understood already that this monk had Dhamma,

That he'd entered into the Dhamma,

Attained the Dhamma.

And so this was the sixth patriarch of China.

But these days it's not really the same.

We may study about these things,

We may read about them,

About Nibbāna and the states of emptiness.

But it's not like how it was before.

That when these monks,

They gave these teachings,

They were doing that from their hearts and from a place of truth.

So for us,

We listen to suttas,

Sutras already,

But we don't see that.

We chant them all the time,

The nature of physical and mental things,

Like how we chant in the morning chanting each day,

How form is impermanent,

Citta-nica-dukkha-anatta,

And how feeling is impermanent,

How memory is impermanent,

How mental formation,

Sense consciousness is impermanent.

And so these are suttas that we chant every day.

So we should bring these to contemplate.

So like this teaching,

Form is impermanent.

Is that true?

Is it actually like that?

Is form unsatisfactory?

Is it not self?

Is that actually true?

We should contemplate this.

Just like how in Mahāyāna a teacher gives koans,

These Dhamma questions to their students for them to contemplate,

And through that they can attain to the Dhamma.

Or they can have a discussion on the Dhamma,

A master with his disciple,

And they can attain to the Dhamma.

So really this has been happening from the time of the Buddha,

That the Buddha,

He asked the five ascetics,

That form,

Is this constant or inconstant?

And what about feeling,

Memory,

Mental formation,

Sense consciousness?

And the five ascetics,

They answered,

Well it's inconstant.

So then the Buddha asked,

Well that which is inconstant,

Is that happiness or suffering?

And they answered,

Well it's suffering.

So the Buddha then asked,

Well things that are constantly changing,

Which are suffering,

How is it that we could take that as a self?

That's anattā,

Isn't it?

And they responded,

That's right.

So there was this questioning and answering,

This going back and forth,

Discussing on the Dhamma,

Until Sila,

Samadhi and Paññā came together and they awakened to Arahantship.

And so this is a way for those with Bharami to know and attain quickly.

And this is the method that the Zen tradition uses for the teacher to bring about awakening through wisdom.

Like Dighanaka Brahman,

That he went up Vulture's Peak in order to find a place to die where no one died before.

So the Buddha asked him when he met him,

Why have you come here?

And he said,

I'm finding a place where no one had died.

And the Buddha said,

Well you yourself have died here many times.

And he felt this sobriety and dismay when he heard that.

And so the Buddha carried on asking him about the Dhamma.

He asked,

What views do you have?

Because we all have our views.

So the Brahman responded,

My view is that the things which are pleasurable,

I like those things and I want those things.

Things which are not pleasurable,

I don't like them.

And really all people are this way.

We all have that view.

It's been this way right from the time of Dighanaka Brahman to the present moment.

So the Buddha asked him,

Old age,

Sickness and death,

Brahman,

Do you like these?

And he responded,

I don't.

So the Buddha asked,

Well when you get that which you don't like,

Will you be happy or will you suffer?

And he said,

I'll suffer.

So he understood at this point.

He understood the truth in this way.

He understood how if he didn't accept these facts then he would suffer.

And there's no place that we can run away from the truth.

So when he saw in this way then he understood the Dhamma.

So when we've listened to the Dhamma well,

Contemplated in line with it,

Then we gain a clear understanding.

If our bhārami is full then we can see the Dhamma.

So like for myself,

I'm giving these teachings to you.

And these are the teachings of the Buddha.

And it's possible listening to these teachings,

And maybe today while listening to them,

That you can realize the Dhamma.

Or for someone who has great bhārami then they can realize arahantship.

So that's if the energy of their bhārami is full already.

And if it's not full then it shows that it's weak.

So we need to bring it up first,

Cultivate it first,

To be forging our bhārami.

So like a mango which is unripe,

So we need to incubate that or give it some heat first so that it can ripen.

So it's like that with our bhārami that we incubate them,

We provide some heat for them.

So like us coming on this retreat that we're forging our bhāramis,

Making our hearts grow,

Making our wisdom grow.

And so listening to the Dhamma as well,

Cultivating these qualities of mindfulness and wisdom.

So we need to initially to bring about a brightness to our heart.

And we can do that through listening to these teachings.

That really every day we need to be working at purifying our hearts,

At cleaning our hearts.

Whenever they become sad then we should quickly clean them and purify them.

And so if they're not clean yet then we need to be wiping our hearts to bring them to clarity.

And why is that?

It's because we still have defilements and we still have a heart.

So we carry on doing that,

Cleaning them,

Until we can see how everything is empty.

When we see that everything is empty it's like there's no heart anymore.

That the heart is anatta,

It's not self.

There's no suffering in the heart anymore.

But if we're not there yet then we need to put in our efforts.

If we're not there yet then the body is like a bodhi tree.

Then the mind is like a bright mirror.

And if any dust delights on it then we need to be cleaning it,

To be wiping it away.

So to be cultivating dāna,

Sila,

Bhavana,

Generosity,

Virtue in meditation until we can see that the mind is not a being,

It's not an individual,

It's not a me,

It's not a you.

And here we reach the stage of anatta,

Of not-self.

And so we listen to the Dhamma,

Bringing about this brightness and clarity into our hearts,

Contemplating as well.

And this is the way to knowing and seeing the Dhamma.

But we need to forbear first.

We need to be sincere in this first.

So may all of you attain to this true,

The Dhamma.

May you gain a deep understanding in the Dhamma.

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🙏🏾 2025.